The Emergence of Latin American Science Fiction

Rachel Haywood Ferreira

Publication Year: 2011

Early science fiction has often been associated almost exclusively with Northern industrialized nations. In this groundbreaking exploration of the science fiction written in Latin America prior to 1920, Rachel Haywood Ferreira argues that science fiction has always been a global genre. She traces how and why the genre quickly reached Latin America and analyzes how writers in Argentina, Brazil, and Mexico adapted science fiction to reflect their own realities. Among the texts discussed are one of the first defenses of Darwinism in Latin America, a tale of a time-traveling history book, and a Latin American Frankenstein. Latin American science fiction writers have long been active participants in the sf literary tradition, expanding the limits of the genre and deepening our perception of the role of science and technology in the Latin American imagination. The book includes a chronological bibliography of science fiction published from 1775 to 1920 in all Latin American countries.

Cover

Title Page, Copyright

CONTENTS

ILLUSTRATIONS

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This book has been over ten years in the making, and writing it would
have been impossible without an especially broad network of people. I
owe many debts of gratitude for the materials, information, enthusiasm,
and intellectual and moral support of more people and institutions
than can be listed here ...

INTRODUCTION: LATIN AMERICAN SCIENCE FICTION DISCOVERS ITS ROOTS

If Hugo Gernsback’s first act in the inaugural issue of
Amazing Stories was to choose the term that would eventually
become “science fiction” to designate the type of
works that his magazine published, his second act was
to use that term retroactively to label—or retrolabel—
a body of existing texts that he felt belonged to the same ...

1. DISPLACEMENT IN SPACE AND TIME: THE LATIN AMERICAN UTOPIA AND DYSTOPIA

Three of the earliest works of Latin American science
fiction are “Mexico in the Year 1970” [México en el año
1970], hereafter “Mexico 1970” (Mexico, 1844), by the
pseudonymous author Fósforos-Cerillos; Pages from
the History of Brazil Written in the Year 2000 [Páginas
da história do Brasil escripta no anno de 2000], hereafter ...

2. THE IMPACT OF DARWINISM: CIVILIZATION AND BARBARISM MEET EVOLUTION AND DEVOLUTION

In contrast to British writers of scientific romances and
French writers of early science fiction, Stableford tells
us, “American writers after the turn of the century were
much less disposed to adopt premises from evolutionary
theory, and early American speculative fiction was
mostly content to steer clear of this particular war of ...

3. STRANGE FORCES: EXPLORING THE LIMITS OF SCIENCE

Holmberg’s primary aims in Two Factions Struggle for
Life [Dos partidos en lucha] were to spread the Darwinist
message and contribute to the popularization of science
in Argentina.1 Still, it would not do to forget that
Holmberg also authored a fair number of works in
which a supernatural explanation prevails. Although ...

4. THE DOUBLE: FROM SCIENCE TO TECHNOLOGY

The figure of the artificially generated human double
permeates the science fiction genre from proto-science-fictional times to the present. The methods of creation
or re-creation, and the forms that the double takes,
reflect the technology of the day. They also serve as a ...

CONCLUSION: A GLOBAL GENRE IN THE PERIPHERY

In the preface to his excellent book on the early science
fiction of England, France, and the United States, Science
Fiction before 1900, Paul Alkon observes that “science
fiction has from its outset been an international
phenomenon transcending political boundaries while ...

CHRONOLOGY: LATIN AMERICAN SCIENCE FICTION THROUGH 1920

The following chronology covers the science fiction published between the
years 1775 through c. 1920 in all Latin American countries. If a country is not
represented, I do not know of works of proto-or early science fiction published
there. As discussed in the introduction, I have chosen to err on the side of inclusivity
in establishing selection criteria. ...

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